Meyer Shank Racing Indianapolis 500 Practice Day 2 Report

No. 60 AutoNation / SiriusXM Honda with driver Jack Harvey completes 117 laps during the second practice day at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on May 16th.

Top speed clocked as 223.923-mph

Indianapolis- (16 May 2018) Day two at the Brickyard set the stage for a full day of practice, with seven hours of open track for teams to take advantage of. Jack Harvey and Meyer Shank Racing (MSR) continued to test the new 2018 aero kit – which differs from last year’s design.

Putting the technical partnership with Schmidt Peterson Motorsports (SPM) to full use, MSR and SPM worked together during the early afternoon hours of practice to generate data from the four Honda-powered IndyCars across the partnership. For nearly 30 minutes of group running, Harvey and the three SPM machines worked nose to tail, testing options as they alternated the running order.

Harvey immediately showed improvement from the previous day of testing, jumping to a speed of 223.593-mph on just his 12th lap around the 2.5-mile oval. Harvey continued to add laps into his bank, circling the track 56 times before the two o’clock hour.

The final few hours of the day saw the Shank team practice live pit stops while also making several long runs out on track. At the end of the day Harvey was just shy of hitting the 224-mph mark with a fast speed of 223.923-mph after completing 117 total laps. The confidence level continues to build as the team grows its notebook with every session.

“We made a lot of progress running in traffic,” said Harvey. “By the end of the day, I was able to make some legitimate overtakes which is what the race is going to be about. The team made really good progress today. I got more confident with each lap I had. The combination of me being more confident and the team giving me more of what I needed was a really productive end of the day. Honestly, it was a good day and happy about it!”

“Today was really focused on group running,” said Mike Shank. “We did two long group runs and then a fairly long run at the end. We made a lot of progress. It is really hard to tell where everyone else is at because of what kind of tow you get and when you get it. We won’t really know until Friday night where everyone is at in terms of top speed. For us, we actually took a step back which ended up helping make the changes needed to reset the car to be better. Overall, we have so many positives. Jack (Harvey) got a ton of time and experience today. In every regard this team is miles ahead of where we were last year. I am really proud of this group. We will continue to keep our head down and be the one to control our progress and race. I am very pleased with where we are at.”